The Pharmacist
(real name unknown) is a member of The Taught, participating in a plot at the parahuman prison. Appearance The Pharmacist was pale and thin and wore thick rectangular glasses. She wore her hair in a messy bun, with the sides of her head shaved. She didn't appear to have a costume, instead just wearing casual clothing.I’d come in through the side door, Caryatid through the front. The woman -pale and thin with thick-frame rectangular glasses, the sides of her head shaved and her hair tied into a messy bun at the back- had her trash bag of drugs in one hand and fire in the other. Jeans, sneakers, and a purple t-shirt with some new metal band advertised on the front, their logo surrounded by flame. Her head turned from the flames, where a motion of her hand made the swiftly dwindling fire grow, to the window. She’d need hands free to haul it open. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5 Abilities and Powers The Pharmacist is a pyrokinetic with the ability to manifest purple flames from her hands.Purple flames erupted in the woman’s hands. She hurled them at the elegant statue-cape, and the statue burned. Caryatid’s voice rose in alarm, then a prolonged cry of pain. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.4 She could also manually increase the intensity of the fires she created, and extinguish them at will.With each pulse of my aura, the flames grew, and the Pharmacist dashed the flames, extinguishing a swathe of the fire around Lung as if throwing invisible water on the area. I could pulse it, see the response time, repeat, see if it changed. I could establish a rhythm, then fake them out. How fast did they respond then? - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.11 However, she could only extinguish fires that she could see.The Pharmacist extinguished fire, but it seemed she was limited to extinguishing what she could see. Fire burned in crevices, crept out further with more and more speed. It hurt him, and where it hurt him, he healed, and the healing made it burn hotter. With the way it crept along the exterior of his body, she wouldn’t have been able to see all of the flame without being here. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.11 The Pharmacist's flames ignite nearby active powers, spreading across them like normal fire across oil.“Don’t use your power! The fire ignites powers!” I saw the woman at the other end of the room react to that. That observation was blunted by the more pressing fact that I was on fire and I could feel the heat. My costume had absorbed the worst of it. Get away, I thought. The rule for the powered dealing with trumps – especially the ones that screwed with powers. I had to fight my instinct to get away faster by flying. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5I pushed out with my aura, for maximum range. I wasn’t sure the power mattered, but I gave that my all too. I squeezed my eyes shut. The aura reached the woman and reached the flame she held. The aura ignited- the woman’s fire spread across powers like flame across oil, and I’d filled the space within a hundred feet of me with ambient power. Gas. Aerosol. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5 For example, this effect applies to Breaker forms,I looked over in Caryatid’s direction. She’d crumpled over, and she looked like she was alternately trying to stop, drop, and roll and be very still while the flames licked her costume and skin. The skin I could see at her hand looked angry and red, her other hand gripping her arm at the elbow. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5 Shaker effects“Listen to me!” I screamed the words. Then, in anger, lashing out in much the same way I might have struck her across the face with the back of my hand, I used my aura. This time the fire exploded. Purple flames became purple-white and blindingly bright, filling my vision in the course of filling the room. I threw up my forcefield on reflex alone, and my thoughts followed a moment later, with a stark awareness of why that was a bad idea. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5, and even Master effects such as Goddess's alignment.Goddess matched him, lifting herself up, the purple fire catching and then tracing the invisible diagrams and forces that buoyed her, only a few feet behind her because she moved fast enough to outrun its pace. More fire traced other powers she was using, blinding her and burning away the invisible, abstract forces that reached out from her and toward Lung’s brain. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.10 Perceiving the fires using Thinker powers, such as Crystalclear's vision“''Fuck'',” Crystalclear swore. “That fire is painful to look at with my senses being what they are.” “Yeth.” The fire. Purple flame. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.10 or Goddess's danger sense,“I wouldn’t say for sure that it’s over,” I said. “And if it isn’t over, we won’t have much of an opportunity.” “I’d use my danger sense, but the fires blind me,” she remarked. “Understandable.” - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.11 is painful. The Pharmacist's flames also ignored power-based invulnerability.The second place my thoughts kept getting caught on was the master-stranger protocols, because I’d been thinking about them so recently. What was the law, the rule, the textbook way to do this? Other protocols, other rules or by-the-books procedures. This, for all intents and purposes, was a trump power, because it affected or involved other powers. Penetrating supposed invulnerability? - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5 History Background The Pharmacist had an unspecified criminal history. Post-Fallen fall As Breakthrough began to investigate the conspiracy surrounding the parahuman prison, the Pharmacist was identified as one of their top suspects. They assigned The Major Malfunctions to keep an eye on her.“We’ll have to figure out where the woman with the pills went. Maybe if we get the destroyed tech to Lookout?” “The woman from the house? Our target?” Caryatid asked. She was still gripping her arm with one hand. Her skin looked red, even in the meager light. “That’s what she had in the bag?” “Yeah,” I said. “Can you remember who she was? We gave you a list, and she was number-” “Number two,” Caryatid said. My brain was so tired. I shook my head a bit. “Can you remember her job?” “The prison pharmacist,” Caryatid said. “High risk because of her access and criminal history.” - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.5 The Pharmacist, along with numerous Teacher thralls, eventually participated in a fight against the Major Malfunctions, the Patrol Block, Antares, and Capricorn, but she escaped and proceeded to the prison.Gleaming 9.5 At the prison, the Pharmacist fought against Goddess and her aligned capes with Lung, with whom her power worked well.“He paired Lung and the Pharmacist,” I voiced my thought aloud. “Who and who?” Ratcatcher asked. “Teacher picked a mercenary tag-team who want to level the prison just as much as Goddess does. If we don’t want people to get hurt, then we’re going to need to step in. Lung is… an old enemy. Since half my life ago, about.” - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.10 Eventually, they were defeated, and the Pharmacist was captured. She had taken the power-nullifying drugs, making her immune to Goddess's power, but was incapacitated.“It’s a power nullifying chemical,” the same woman said. She stepped forward. Words were tattooed beneath her eyes, so they traced straight lines down to her jaw. ‘Crock’ and ‘Shit’. Colorful, for words in black ink. More ink put scales at her arms and neck. “Nullifying your influence, Goddess.” “And you took some,” Goddess told the Pharmacist. “She did. And she already got some to key prisoners,” Crock o Shit said. “The maximum security ones, who get meals delivered.” Purple fire surrounded the Pharmacist’s hands. She reached for Goddess, and she made it one step before someone swung a guard’s baton into her throat. She fell to the ground, fire extinguished. “If she doesn’t suffocate from that, let her live,” Goddess said. “The drugs will wear off.” - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.11 Post-Goddess' Takeover The Pharmacist's fate following Goddess's death and the rise of the Red Queen is unknown. Trivia *The Pharmacist's power bears some resemblance to a power that Wildbow described as an example power for a given trigger event.I'm leaning toward shaker or breaker for the kid. We don't see any particulars about the blasts (except that it's erratic), but I'd say the kid is liable to become a morass of that same energy. Shaker-esque, with some -kinesis and some natural flexibility. Budding factors in here. Background elements that come into play - the nice guy is bad and dad is angry and yelling and scary. The child's power is nondiscriminatory. Dangerous to friendlies, in short. ... There's a(n indirect) master and (noticeable) trump element to this power. Any active power use nearby makes the energy grow, swell, and detonate. Given any active parahuman abilities, the fire leaps for it and runs along it, like fire might run up an oil slick. Susie here can also create patches of this reactive energy, intentionally grow and detonate the patches, or utilize them to 'toss' things her way. If attacked and if she's close to one, she can also 'toss' herself away, with a sort of reactive thinker/shaker rocket jump (except not nearly as elegant) that knocks her sprawling but is likely to do less damage than whatever was about to hit her - it's questionable if she has any real control over this. - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit Site Navigation Category:Females Category:Villains Category:Trump Category:Blaster Category:Shaker Category:The Taught Category:Characters Category:Ward Characters